A Web-Centric Preference Acquisition and Decision Support System Employing Decision Times to express Relative Preferences

Abstract

This paper presents the general theory and techniques involving a web-centric preference acquisition and decision support system employing decision times to express relative preferences or degrees of confidence with respect to decision alternatives. This is an alternative, neural net-motivated method employing decision times or reaction time metrics and a set of decision analytic techniques for capturing, synthesizing, and analyzing decisions, opinions, confidence, and preferences from subject matter experts as well as from the general population. The paper's first part describes a methodology for transforming the time it takes to make a decision among a number of choices, two-at-a-time, into a set of ratio scaled relative preference or confidence and decision consistency scores using a modified Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) approach. The second part describes a method for synthesizing individual results into a group decision metric, and for assessing the stability of a decision, where stability is the propensity of an individual or group to 'change its mind' and defect to alternative choices. In the third part the focus is on the generality of the approach in terms of how this alternative methodology can be used in different application areas. In the concluding part, a live, web-centric decision support environment enabling geographically distant decision makers to collaborate in a distributed environment, employing the methodology, is illustrated by discussing screen shots of the application.

Open PDF

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Oct 31, 2003
Accession Number
ADA418487

Entities

People

  • Jerald L. Feinstein

Organizations

  • George Washington University

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Human Systems
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Acquisition
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Commerce
  • Computational Science
  • Databases
  • Decision Support Systems
  • Difference Equations
  • Differential Equations
  • Eigenvalues
  • Equations
  • Information Science
  • Information Systems
  • Judgment
  • Neural Networks
  • Psychology
  • Standards
  • Test And Evaluation

Readers

  • Gender and Food Studies
  • Regression Analysis.
  • Systems Analysis and Design